FIRST MAJOR STUDY OF THE POSTER AS ART (POSTER ART.) Maindron, Ernest. Les Affiches illustrées * Les Affiches illustrées (1886-1895) * Les Affiches Étrangères illustrées. Together, 3 volumes (complete). 20, 64, and 62 chromolithographs, respectively, and numerous reproductions by Boutet de Monvel, Mucha, Chéret, Bauwens, Steinlen, Grasset Hayashi, La Forgue, Meier-Graefe, Pennell, and others. Large 4to, uniform 3/4 burgundy morocco handsomely gilt along spines, some moderate rubbing; original wrappers bound in, scattered light toning and finger soiling; first volume with early bookseller's description stapled to front blank. Paris, 1886, 1896, 1897
numbers 141, 440, and 551 respectively, from editions of 1000 copies each. "Ernest Maindron curated an exhibition on the history of advertising in 1889 and wrote two books on the poster, the first appearing in 1886 and the second a decade later. Like Alexandre and Fénéon, he was keen to establish the validity of the poster as an art form. His reasoning, however, was different. Where they hinted that the canonical ordering of the arts was in itself a questionable practice, he simply tried to tinker with the canon by revising the status of the poster, to which he gave all the attributes of a fine art"--Marcus Verhagen, "The Poster in Fin-de-Siècle Paris: 'That Mobile and Degenerate Art'" in Cinema and the Invention of Modern Life, page 110; Carteret IV, 260. - Monod 7642.
